


The Washerwoman's Song (Jane Doe in a Cardboard Box remix)

by misura



Category: Rivers of London - Ben Aaronovitch
Genre: Gen, Homophobic Language, POV Outsider, Racist Language
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-28
Updated: 2015-06-28
Packaged: 2018-04-06 15:25:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 948
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4227015
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/misura/pseuds/misura
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What the neighbors think.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Washerwoman's Song (Jane Doe in a Cardboard Box remix)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ExtraPenguin](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ExtraPenguin/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Jane Doe in a Cardboard Box](https://archiveofourown.org/works/3277190) by [ExtraPenguin](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ExtraPenguin/pseuds/ExtraPenguin). 
  * In response to a prompt by [ExtraPenguin](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ExtraPenguin/pseuds/ExtraPenguin) in the [remixmadness2015](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/remixmadness2015) collection. 



Oh, but it was a lovely old gent that was living in that big old building down the street, wasn't it?

He'd been there before Tina'd come here - _'a bit odd, but harmless, really,'_ Ann Tovlar had told her, the day after she'd moved in and had gone round to meet the neighbors. _'We could do with more of that around here,'_ and her husband who was named Will or Liam or William, depending on when you asked and whether or not he fancied you at the time, he'd snorted and said, _'What, folks that're a bit odd? Bloody hell, Ann. Tell the world, why don't you?'_

(This was before she'd found out about their kid Norm, of course, who was 'like that', as they'd said it in her old neighborhood. Like that. A bit odd. Well. The good uns always were, weren't they?)

 

Nobody quite seemed sure what to think of the black one. _'Neither odd nor harmless, that one,'_ Ann had pronounced, lounging on her couch like the Queen herself, but by then Tina'd talked to some other folks in the neighborhood as well, enough to know that half the time, Ann had no idea what she was talking about. _'Probably some reformed hooligan or something.'_

Tina didn't think he looked like a hooligan and said so.

 _'See?'_ Ann said, looking smug and triumphant. _'Reformed. Trying to keep his nose clean and his head down. Probably got all sorts of bad friends that're looking for him. Maybe a girl or two, too - his kind always does. Might have left one of 'em pregnant, even.'_ Ann shuddered, as if this idea, this fantasy that had popped out of her mouth had genuinely surprised her. Now that it'd come out though, she rather liked it. Tina could tell.

 _'Worse things to be than a hooligan,'_ Liam said, and Tina had decided there and then that she didn't like Liam very much - which was kind of funny, really, considering. Bit late, too.

 

The fact was, though, that they were clearly together in some way. The nice old gent and the man who might or might not be a reformed hooligan. The posh one and the black one.

And if you'd asked Tina, well, she'd have told you she wasn't one to speculate, really, not like Ann, who made things up out of thin air and then shared them with the world as pure fact, but there it was.

She figured it was probably hormones or something - course, she hadn't known she was pregnant at the time; she'd simply figured she'd put on a bit of weight, nothing to be ashamed of - certainly none of the gents at the pub seemed to think so, always looking as she walked by.

Looking, yes, but not touching. Not 'less she said it was all right, which she wasn't gonna, being of sound body and mind and all that.

( _'Always was a bit loopy,'_ Ann'd tell the press about her, barely six months later. _'Figgered she was too good for this place, did Tina,'_ and, honestly, who wouldn't?)

 

It was love, then. The kind that strangled, not the kind that freed.

The posh old gent, quietly pining away for some reformed hooligan who'd saved his life once - course, he'd always known he was 'like that'. Probably had a few good rows with his family about it, but then, he was their only son, the heir to some fancy title, so what were they going to do?

Not cut him off, completely, clearly, unless that car of his had been some sort of going away present, which Tina didn't think. If she'd been capable of picking her own dreams, she'd have dreamt about driving that car. Somewhere. Anywhere.

On some level, she reckoned, the black one had to know. Oh, sure, there'd been a girl with him a couple of times, but they'd seemed friendly, not 'friendly'. Not like Norm and his Oscar.

Sad, really, how they were both stuck right where they were. Just like she was. Just like everyone.

 

It was going to be a girl, they told Tina. Healthy, which was good.

She went shopping for pink nappies, pink dresses. Pink wallpaper. She picked a room to put the baby in, with a little bed and a little window and a couple of cute lamps hanging from the ceiling.

She thought of how the old gentleman and his friend-who-was-just-a-friend would probably never get to do those things, thought of the older gentleman's mother, getting on a bit in years herself by now, spending her days sitting next to a phone that wasn't ever going to ring, not unless she picked it up herself first, because family was like that, like love.

It could choke all the life, all the laughter straight out of you, right until it killed you.

 

So, really, it would be a kindness.

Get everyone all nice and un-stuck.

 _'Whose is it?'_ Ann kept asking, always pushing. _'Whose? You can tell me, Tina. We're friends, aren't we?'_

Liam was hiding behind his newspaper, always a coward, unless he had a couple of drinks in him. Not looking anymore, and not touching, either, for all that Tina reckoned he wouldn't say 'no' if she offered.

She imagined pushing him into the Thames, watching him wash away with all the other trash, but then, what had the river ever done to her to deserve that, really?

 

A cardboard box and a baby, and this would be her gift to two people she'd never even spoken to.

She left them both in front of the car she'd never get to drive or even ride in, and started walking.

Never looked back.


End file.
